# Date: 1921-11-25

b) In the sphere of propaganda work, the Agitation Department of the CC and the Main Committee for Political Education establish the same mutual relations as in the sphere of agitation campaigns, with the organization of propaganda work among party members not being separated into a special branch.

c) In the sphere of work of agitation apparatuses, general plans for their utilization (tours by rail, waterways, etc.) are worked out jointly with the Agitprop of the CC and the Main Committee for Political Education.

d) The combination of the position of head of the agitation department of the Agitprop of the CC and the agitation department of the Main Committee for Political Education is permissible by agreement between the Agitprop Department and the Main Committee for Political Education and with the sanction of the CC, whereby this combination does not relieve the head of the agitation department of responsibility before the Main Committee for Political Education, on an equal basis with other department heads.

5. Mutual relations in the sphere of work of the periodical press department (ROSTA) are based on the following principles:

a) political instruction of the press is carried out by an authorized member of the CC, directly through the responsible head of ROSTA;

b) mutual relations in the sphere of current work are determined by special agreements worked out by the Agitprop Department of the CC and the Main Committee for Political Education with the participation of ROSTA and confirmed by the CC;

c) the combination of positions or the appointment of editors of the Agitprop and journalists as authorized representatives of the CC is permitted under the conditions indicated in section d) of § 4.

6. Mutual relations of the Agitprop of the CC and the Main Committee for Political Education in the remaining spheres of work (liquidation of illiteracy, artistic work, propaganda, programmatic-bibliographic work) are based on the following:

a) the working out of various questions in the sphere of methodology of work is carried out by the Main Committee for Political Education with the participation, in necessary cases, of the GUS.¹

b) The Agitprop Department of the CC, through its propaganda sub-department, exercises control over the work of the Main Committee for Political Education in the sphere of servicing Soviet party schools and courses on political literacy and participates in the working out of their programs on the basis indicated in section a).

In accordance with this, the proposed expansion of the apparatus of the Agitprop Department of the CC should be limited to the formation of sub-departments of agitation, propaganda, and press, which do not branch out into more detailed spheres. The task of the Agitprop Department should be agitation and propaganda having a purely party character (see sections 11, 18, 19, 23—29 of the new statute on the Agit. Prop. Dept. of the CC RCP, as well as agitation campaigns of a party character—section a) of § 4 of the present draft), and participation in the work of state propaganda of communism, conducted by the Main Committee for Political Education in its capacity as an auxiliary organ of the CC in connection with its current work of the Main Committee for Political Education.

In view of this, all points of the new statute on the Agitprop Department of the CC, except those enumerated, should be repealed and replaced by new ones, coordinated with the present draft.

Published according to typescript copy,
with underlinings and notes by V. I. Lenin

¹ The Main Committee for Political Education (The Chief Political-Educational Committee of the Republic), as one of the most important Chief Administrations of Soviet power, was created with the direct participation of V. I. Lenin. On 28 October 1920, Lenin drew up a "Draft Resolution of the Politburo of the CC RCP(b) on the Main Committee for Political Education" (see Complete Collected Works, vol. 41, p. 397), which was entirely incorporated into the resolution on this question adopted at a meeting of the Politburo of the CC on the same day. N. K. Krupskaya was appointed chair of the Main Committee for Political Education. Lenin devoted a series of documents to the tasks of this organ and its activities, including: a speech at the All-Russian Conference of political education officials of provincial and district departments of public education on 3 November 1920, a report at the II All-Russian Congress of Political Education Officials on 17 October 1921, and others (see Complete Collected Works, vol. 41, pp. 398—408; vol. 44, pp. 155—175).

A red thread running through all the materials is Lenin's idea of organizing, through the Main Committee for Political Education under the leadership of the party, the communist education of the working people and the development in them of communist consciousness, the establishment of new social bonds between people, the education of a new attitude to labor and new discipline. Subjecting to devastating criticism the bourgeois preaching of political neutrality, Lenin emphasized the necessity of party leadership of all spheres of state, economic, and social life. He said that in the work of the Main Committee for Political Education "the supremacy of the policy of the communist party must be openly recognized" (Complete Collected Works, vol. 41, p. 402). In this same direction the remarks of Lenin on the published document were made.

² GUS—State Scientific Council.

NOTES ON THE STRUCTURE OF THE AGITPROP OF THE CC RCP(b)
[1921, November, after 25]

Head: Sosnovskii
Deputies: Yakovlev
Solovev¹

1) Sub-department
of Propaganda
Khotimskii
assistant
[unclear]

2) Sub-department
of Agitation
Yakovlev (on the basis
of concurrent employment
[2 deputies to the Main Committee
for Political Education]
agitation campaigns
assistant: ?

3) Sub-department
of Provincial Press
Bardin № 22-23
"Bulletin of Agitation
and Propaganda"²
Instructors: Hessen
Samsonov

4) Department for National Minorities
Head: Kopyatkevich³

¹ L. S. Sosnovskii—member of the Bolshevik party since 1904. In 1918—1924 (with interruptions) editor of the newspaper "Bednota." During the trade union discussion (1920—1921) supported Trotsky's platform. In 1927 he was expelled from the party as an active participant in the Trotskyist opposition. In 1935 he was reinstated, and in 1936 he was again expelled from the party for anti-party activity.

Ya. A. Yakovlev—member of the Bolshevik party since 1913; active participant in the October Socialist Revolution and the Civil War in Ukraine.

V. I. Solovev—party member since 1913. In 1920 he was a member of the Commission for working out a draft reorganization of the People's Commissariat of Education; in 1921 he was deputy chair of the Main Committee for Political Education, subsequently a member of the collegium of the Agitprop Department of the CC RCP(b).

² This refers to an article by Il. Vardin in the organ of the CC RCP(b) "Bulletin of Agitation and Propaganda" № 22-23 for November 1921, "On the Needs of Party-Soviet Periodical Press." In the article, the author discusses in detail the state of provincial periodical press and raises the question of what measures are necessary to enable the newspaper and periodical press to occupy a worthy place in the life of the party and people.

³ A. A. Kopyatkevich—manager of the affairs of the CC RCP(b).

* Words could not be deciphered.